The Portuguese ensemble Juventus Ensemble, under the direction of Filipe Pinto-Ribeiro, will perform on Friday, 21 November, as part of the 25th Annual Folhas de Álbum Cycle, organized by the Badajoz Philharmonic Society and sponsored by the Badajoz City Council. The concert will take place at 8:30 p.m. in the main hall of the City Hall building. Admission is free, subject to seating capacity.

The ensemble—Arieta Liatsi (violin), Alfonso Pinto-Ribeiro (violin), Gustavo Rebelo (viola), Sofía Torres Durán (cello), and Telmo Costa (clarinet)—will perform two outstanding works for strings and clarinet by Antonín Dvořák and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

The program opens with Dvořák’s String Quartet in F major, Op. 96, known as the “American Quartet”, the composer’s twelfth string quartet. Written in 1893 during his summer stay in Spillville, Iowa, while he was serving as director (1892–1895) of the National Conservatory of Music of America in New York.

The work marks a turning point in Dvořák’s chamber music output. After decades of striving to reconcile his rich melodic invention with clear formal structure, the two elements finally converge in this masterpiece.

The second work on the program is Mozart’s Clarinet Quintet in A major, K. 581, the only clarinet quintet he ever composed. Completed in 1789, it is regarded as one of the most beautiful works in the clarinet repertoire and is especially admired for its lyrical melodies, most notably in the second movement.

JUVENTUS ENSEMBLE REÚNE OS MELHORES TALENTOS EMERGENTES

Founded in 2022, the Juventus Ensemble takes its name from the Roman goddess of youth. Its main goal is to serve as a creative platform and a catalyst for opportunities for the most promising emerging talents on today’s musical scene.

A flexible-formation ensemble, it made its debut at the Bragança ClassicFest, performing works by Eurico Carrapatoso and Antonín Dvořák. The ensemble promotes concerts and artistic residencies in collaboration with internationally renowned artists such as Pascal Moraguès, Jack Liebeck, Stephan Picard, and Filipe Pinto-Ribeiro, exploring repertoire from a wide range of musical periods and styles.

Among the young musicians who have taken part in its concerts are violinists Alfonso Pinto-Ribeiro, Arieta Liatsi, and Xunyue Zhang; violists Francisco Lourenço, Sofia Silva Sousa, and Gustavo Rebelo; cellists Geirthrudur Gudmundsdottir and Ghilherme Moraes; double bassist Rui Pedro Rodrigues; harpsichordist Rafaela Salgado; clarinetist João Paiva; and flutist Sónia Pais.

In 2023, the Juventus Ensemble gave the world premiere of the sextet Dreaming and Thinking by American composer Bruce Adolphe, as part of the Musical-Mente Cycle in Porto. That same year, the ensemble made its international debut with two concerts at the Festival de Musique de Prémery in France.

The Juventus Ensemble is supported by the Directorate-General for the Arts of the Portuguese Ministry of Culture.